A Dream of Ice Read online

  Ben laughed, and despite her anxiety over the afternoon’s events, Caitlin smiled too as memories—her own—flooded back warmly, the repetitive, stalling Alphonse and Gaston bits they sometimes stumbled into.

  “It’s good to be home,” Ben said to avoid the logjam. “Obligatory question number one: how are you?”

  “Better, for the moment,” she answered truthfully.

  “Glue or spit?”

  “Glit,” she replied. That was something Ben used to ask her before an exam: did she know the material or was she winging it, was she held together securely with glue or tentatively with spit.

  God, our past is good, she thought.

  “What’s obligatory question number two?” she asked.

  “Hold on, woman. I don’t consider ‘glit’ an answer.”

  She whispered, “It’s Galderkhaani for ‘I’m going to take whatever the world dishes out, even if it takes some time and adjustment.’ ”

  “I don’t remember that one,” Ben said.

  “You’d have to have been there,” she said sheepishly. “In Galderkhaan.”

  Ben laughed out loud.

  “That’s my Cai,” he said. “Just walk right over to the eight-hundred-pound gorilla in the room and kick him in the stones.”

  “Question two?”

  “Us. In English, please.”

  “Specifically?”

  Ben looked around. “Since our sleepover,” he said delicately.

  Caitlin shoved her hands in her jacket pockets. “I don’t know how you’re feeling about our night together, and I’m not completely sure how I’m feeling about it either. I don’t have the first clue about going forward, I just think that we should—”

  She stopped as she noticed that Ben was not just grinning but chuckling.

  “What?” There was annoyance in her voice but she couldn’t help smiling.

  “Oh, I’ve got you. I’ve totally got you.”

  “Care to elaborate?”

  “This is going to kill you. Caitlin O’Hara,” he whispered into her ear, “it’s only been a week and change. And I’m a guy. And there you are, getting deep and intense about it—”

  She narrowed her eyes at him in mock offense, then chuckled and shook her head. “Damn, I’m doing the Girl Brain thing.”

  “Like you’re in high school,” he chortled. “You have a crush on me, a crushy crush!”

  She swatted him on the arm. “You might speak a dozen languages but modern slang is not one.” Then she laughed wholeheartedly for the first time in days. It felt good.

  “Move, ya lovebirds, before I crush ya,” said the construction worker behind them. “The man’s waiting for your order.”

  “Sorry,” Ben said, though he continued to mock her while their food was being prepared. They stood in silence and then headed toward the small courtyard behind her building. Caitlin couldn’t wait and took her first bite as they walked, exclaiming how good her dinner was.

  “Note to self,” Ben said, “she’s got Girl Brain and she’s a cheap date.”

  “Note to self,” Caitlin echoed, “watch out. He’s making noises like he’s planning for some kind of future.”

  “Not true,” Ben replied. “I know better. I wish I didn’t.”

  They allowed the relationship discussion a respectful moment to die before moving on.

  “All right then, Ben,” Caitlin said. “Back to the gorilla. Give me the good stuff.”

  He looked around puckishly. “What, here, in public?”

  “Grow up. What new translations have you done?”

  “Oh.”

  “Yeah, oh. I’m assuming you worked during your flight.”

  “Guilty. My astonished cries woke the man sitting next to me. He looked at me funny.”

  “You should be used to that.”

  “Seriously, no exaggeration, I did actually vocalize at one point. Galderkhaan. Galder. Khaan. Remind you of anything?”

  “No.”

  “Old Norse and . . . ?”

  Caitlin stopped chewing, then stopped walking. “No way. That obvious?”

  “That obvious. I have no idea what the ‘Galder’ is but ‘khaan’ means the same thing as the Mongolian word—a title for a lord and master.”

  “Who used it more,” Caitlin asked, “Priests or Technologists?”

  “Very clever, you. First thing I checked. It wasn’t the Priests.”

  “That’s surprising,” she said. “I would have thought they’d be the ones into the ‘supreme being’ thing.”

  “You’re thinking like a modern person,” Ben pointed out. “Things were different then and there.”

  A long, relaxed walk later, Ben guided Caitlin into Paley Park, a small courtyard that had more benches than trees. They had the courtyard to themselves. The views were mostly of brick, with an oblong of sky above. But it was quiet, save for a freestanding wall at the back lit in russet gold and covered with long, beautiful, gently melodious rivulets of water.

  “So was this khaan a god for the Technologists or a great ruler?” Caitlin asked.

  “I don’t know. My guess, based on nothing but intuition, is that the volcano was the khaan, given their focus on geothermal energy. Think Vulcan, Hades, the gods of the underworld.”

  Caitlin made a face. “Somehow I’m reluctant to ascribe that kind of primal mind-set to them.”

  “Why? It was good enough for the Greeks, Romans, and just about every other culture, including ours. Is modern religion any different? How many people believe in the ‘fire god’ we call Satan?”

  “Okay, point taken,” Caitlin said. “So with khaan in the name of the city or whatever Galderkhaan was, does that mean the Technologists were in power?”

  “Shared and equal power, as far as I can make out, but with increasing hostility between them. Not physical hostility; there was a reference to banishment for anyone who used violence. Anyway, the two groups did split the place.”

  “Geographically?”

  “Nothing formalized”—Ben nodded at the pieces of the Berlin Wall that were displayed on one side of the park—“but each had their sector and there they lived.”

  “Glogharasor and Belhorji?” Caitlin couldn’t believe she was casually pulling names from one of her trances as if they were “Manhattan” and “Brooklyn.”

  Ben regarded her. “Yes. Jesus.”

  “Don’t do that,” Caitlin said. “I’m trying not to freak myself out.”

  “Sorry,” he said. “Sorry. The Priests lived in Glogharasor. They used the root word ‘Glogharas’ when they spoke of themselves—the ‘dawn seers.’ ”

  “And Belhorji?”

  “Don’t know yet,” he admitted.

  Caitlin returned to her food. She wasn’t very hungry but needed something to do. Saying those two names had caused something strange to happen inside her.

  “Cai, are you okay?”

  “Hmm? Yeah. Yes. Why?”

  “You looked like you went somewhere.”

  “No, there’s just—an idea. A thought. I don’t know why I had it.”

  “Speak,” he said encouragingly.

  “Galderkhaan,” she said. “If there’s anything left of it, we should find it.”

  “I’m all for that, but how? And why, specifically?”

  “Maybe it’s not as strange and remote as we think,” Caitlin said. “How do we know that things haven’t been found and misidentified and hidden in museums and universities somewhere, the way meteors and fossils have been for centuries?”

  “I’m glad to hear you say that,” Ben said. “I had that idea myself. While I was in London I took a turn through the British Museum, looked at the relics with fresh eyes, peered here and there for Galderkhaani writing, wondered the same thing. I couldn’t find anything, though.”

  He stared at her as she munched. She looked at the fountain.

  “Cai?”

  “I’m here,” she said as she glanced at her phone and saw that there were no text upda
tes from Anita about Jacob. “Do you mind if we walk some more—maybe just around the block?”

  “Not a bit, if those heels of yours don’t care.”

  She smiled a little as they stood and left the courtyard, binning their food containers on their way out.

  “The frustrating thing is I’m running out of things to translate,” Ben went on. “I only have about twelve minutes of tape from all those sessions. And I’d really like to know why there were several mentions of agriculture in the sky.”

  “You’re sure it says ‘in’ and not ‘under’?” Even as she asked it, she regretted it.

  “Caitlin, this is me. I’ve checked it a dozen times and it’s unmistakable. Of course it’s nonsense, unless they were doing something on a mountaintop or caldera—but then they would have said ‘mountaintop’ or ‘caldera’ and not specifically used the word ‘sky.’ ”

  “Right. These people were pretty specific about things.”

  “Lots of words, very little nuance when the hand gestures were added.”

  She chuckled. “Sounds wonderful.”

  “What does?”

  “A civilization without nuance. You’re this or that, a word is that or this. Understanding was instant and absolute.”

  He put a hand on her arm to slow her to a stop.

  “What?” she asked.

  “Where would I fit? In that language, I mean?”

  She looked into his sweet smoke-colored eyes. And because she couldn’t answer him, she kissed him. She kissed him until she knew that when he asked, she would say yes.

  Caitlin briefly considered staying where they were. She discarded that idea, though; she might have felt like a college kid again but being spotted in public could cost her her job. There was the laundry room—but then, she decided, she was just being ornery for the sake of it.

  She called Anita.

  “How is Jacob?” she asked.

  “Fine,” Anita replied. “You don’t have to check every hour—Jacob is sleeping peacefully.”

  “Actually, I’m coming back,” Caitlin said. “We’re coming back.”

  “Oh!” Anita said. “Reaching for coat as we speak.”

  Caitlin ended the call and they went upstairs. Anita greeted them on her way out.

  “Halal?” she said, sniffing once.

  “From a cart,” Ben said. “Not my idea.” He added quickly, “But perfect.”

  “Thank you,” Caitlin said as Anita slipped past them.

  “Happy to help,” she replied, pulling the door shut.

  As they moved into the apartment, neither of them reached for a light switch. They went to Caitlin’s bedroom, where they circled each other, peeling clothes, turning slowly closer and closer to a window full of distant, scattered lamplights. Falling onto the bed below, pressing into him, Caitlin felt like she was inhaling Ben’s skin. The sensation felt full of nostalgia and promise, and almost relief. She bathed in the perfection of normality for a long while. Then, still touching him as completely as two bodies can, she let their linked limbs flow like the brass in Barbara’s Celtic knot.

  “Oh god,” Ben breathed, and she knew he was feeling the vastness too, dropping down and reaching into and through them. It was utterly, wholly dark. A darkness never seen on Earth—but not threatening. Not in the least frightening. An ancient and serene darkness.

  And then something happened to Caitlin. Something more potent and longer lasting than she had ever experienced.

  • • •

  Later, as Ben was getting dressed, he attempted to put words on it.

  “No,” she cut him off. “Let it be what it was. You got it. You don’t need to translate it.”

  His arm went around her waist and she felt again the wild joy of having both touch and—beyond touch.

  “Words are what I do,” he half-apologized.

  “Yes? And what did I do?”

  “I don’t follow.”

  She squirmed against his arm. “That wasn’t—like before.”

  “No.” Ben smiled as he let go of her and looked dreamily out at the lamps across the blocks of Manhattan. “It was great, beyond great, and we can leave it at that.”

  Caitlin smiled as she watched him leave in the dark. She was glad he agreed, because she didn’t want to explain what she really meant.

  That toward the end, something indistinct had appeared in her mind, silhouetted against the light and dark in its own changing pattern. Something dimly familiar, vitally alive.

  Ben was not the only one with whom she’d been joined. Someone else had been reaching toward her from beyond and that someone was not a man.

  CHAPTER 8

  Seated in a tiny red Twin Otter plane, Mikel couldn’t recall a bumpier, more unnerving flight. Every thrust of turbulence jostled him up, down, and to the sides, often in rapid succession. Nonetheless, he kept his cheek pressed to the window and his eye scanning the ice as they headed to the Halley VI base.

  The dozen others on board were mostly British Antarctic Survey scientists. The only one who seemed not to fit—besides Mikel—was a young man sitting across the aisle, Siem der Graaf. Prior to takeoff, Mikel had overheard that he was half Dutch, half Kenyan, with British citizenship. Siem wasn’t a fellow researcher, which meant he was maintenance, which meant he was a replacement for either the dead or the missing staff member at Halley. The scientists weren’t rude to him; they just had other things to discuss, data to review, topics of mutual importance to mull over in huddled secrecy.

  Mikel had not learned much more than the fact that troubles at the base, and momentarily favorable weather conditions, had caused the flight to be moved a week ahead of schedule. The scientists had tolerated Mikel’s presence only because Flora had pulled some strings with the Royal Air Force; although what strings Mikel was not privy to.

  At some point over the Weddell Sea, Siem—his six-foot-seven-inch frame wedged with miserable discomfort into his narrow seat, head barely clearing the bulkhead—gave up waiting for a friendly chat that never came and plugged his ears with music while he reviewed documents on his tablet. The music leaking from his headphones was heavy metal, especially slow and grim, probably from Finland. Mikel knew he could use this man. Now all he needed to find was his target.

  Just a half hour or so out from the base, still over the Weddell, Mikel identified it. Mentally noting the location using landmarks, he said nothing to the other passengers.

  There was one other outsider on the flight, Ivor, a garrulous Glaswegian who was getting on just fine with the scientists because he had information they needed. At different times during the eight-hour flight he had walked them through laptop training sessions about the eight main modules of Halley VI and the outlying buildings, dressing for the weather, the components of a climbing kit, and driving a Ski-Doo. Mikel paid as much attention to all of these as discretion would permit. He’d learned his survival skills when he traveled to McMurdo Station in Antarctica a few years back, but a refresher was most welcome. The Glaswegian made the scientists parrot back what seemed like six hundred safety concerns and precautionary measures, and couched everything in terms of potential damage to the base and the machines, not the people.

  The plane landing was lumpy, skidding, and as backbone-unfriendly as the flight itself. The passengers zipped and buttoned their coats, donned tinted goggles against the near-perpetual brilliant daylight, and hurried to the nearest module.

  Mikel was taken to a guest bunk but did not stay there. Instead he kept close to Siem as the young man oriented himself to his new surroundings. Finally, Mikel found his moment to approach Siem in the large red modular building that served as the social heart of the base.

  He and the replacements were being served one of the additional meals that enabled Halley VI residents to ingest the six thousand calories a day required for the climate. In the dining area, the Glaswegian placed his tray as close as possible to the pool table and challenged one of the female scientists to a game. Siem walked carefully
across the blue carpet, trying to avoid building up static, though he’d been told it was a futile effort in Antarctica. He stopped at a table full of red chairs and maintenance staffers and almost as a body they found excuses to stand and leave.

  When Mikel sat opposite him he saw that Siem’s nose was bleeding. He handed the young man a tissue and smiled.

  “Those are fairly standard around here,” Mikel said, slicing into his passable version of chicken cordon bleu. “Cold, dry air, increase in blood pressure—bad combination.”

  “So I’ve heard,” Siem mumbled, stuffing shreds of tissue in both nostrils. “What do they think, that I’ve got a disease?”

  “No, I’m sure they’re used to it.”

  “Then why—?”

  “It’s their version of a hazing,” Mikel explained. “You’re one of them when you don’t bleed or get debilitating earaches. Didn’t you get briefed?”

  “Briefly,” Siem joked, “and not about the social customs. This was all very quick.”

  “So I’ve heard.”

  Siem turned to his own plate, began slicing. “Where are you from?”

  “Pamplona, originally.”

  “You’re not a scientist, though? You weren’t in on the discussions.”

  “No, I’m not part of the cabal,” Mikel laughed. “I’m an anthropologist with a strong streak of archaeologist.”

  “A sensible combination. What are you studying here—are there ancient igloos?”

  “It’s independent research newly underwritten by the US government about Bronze Age magnetic fields and their effects on early civilization.”

  “That’s not something I’d think politicians would care about,” Siem said.

  Mikel leaned forward conspiratorially. “It is, when it’s supported by big donor constituents.”

  “Ah. ‘Money makes honey,’ as my father used to say.”

  “Very true. So I’m here to collect rock samples when I can find them, and spend the rest of my time on readouts, like everyone else.”

  “Very, very heady.”

  The cover story was not entirely farfetched. While Mikel was still in the doctoral program at the University of Córdoba, he had published a paper on the impact of the geologically active Ring of Fire on early Asian society. That study caught the attention of Flora Davies, which was how he came to be employed by the Group.